Inarian language
The Inarian language is the official language of the Kingdom of Inari and one of the major languages within the Empire. Typical features (for later elaboration and development): * All roots are monosyllabic while words are often bisyllabic, bearing a "thematic vowel". It is debatable whether words are truly mono- or bisyllabic. * It is highly agglutinative and semantic / morphological differences may depend on a single sound. * While word order is mostly free, particles within a word have a rather fixed order to avoid confusion between homomorphemes. ** Word order is generally SOV or OSV. * Some dialects have tones, neutral and either rising, falling, rising-falling and falling-rising or high, low, rising, falling. Most have only 2-3 tones besides neutral, however. * Some dialects reduce / add vowels, resulting either to difficult consonant clusters or Japanese-sounding CV©-structure. Classification History Real life history Geographical distribution Phonology Consonants All consonants are pulmonic. A few dialects have developed allophonic ejectives but those are considered marginal. Vowels Diphthongs Phonotactics Virtually all roots, thus words, are monosyllabic. Only some particles may be bisyllabic. Consequently, all monosyllabic roots follow C3V2(C3) pattern, so that there may be several of each stacked but at most three of each per syllable. All syllables begin with a consonant. Written language may show words beginning with a vowel but in that case there is always a glottal stop /ʔ/ preceding it, for example анцъа ''( ) is pronounced ʔan.t͡sʷa. Indeed, the word for a spirit-like god was borrowed from Abkhazian. Stress, rhythm and intonation There is noticeable variation between dialects when it comes to stressing syllables. The challenge lies in which syllables are important enough to highlight so that a certain rhythm is maintained. Standard Inarian, following central dialects, marks the root of a word, or alternatively the most significant (meaningful) root in a compound word with primary stress, which generally makes the nucleus long as well. Any particle surrounding the root may be secondarily stressed based on certain rhythmical patterns. Their nuclei are typically prolonged as well, but the emphasis isn't as strong as in the root. Technically, either the pitch or the pulmonic strength rises towards the primary stress and then falls (diminishes) back. Regional variation Grammar Nouns and noun phrases All nominal roots are constructed on CVC-system, with the variation expanding to up to three of each. Adjectives Pronouns, case and person Prepositions Verbs and verb phrases Tense, aspect and mood Phrasal verbs Adverbs Syntax Basic constituent order Clause syntax Auxiliary verb constructions Questions Discourse level syntax Vocabulary Word formation processes Word origins Inarian influence on surrounding languages Writing systems Dialects, accents, and varieties Central dialects Eastern dialects Western dialects Other minor varieties, mixes and slang Skeleton Inarian has a notoriously difficult sound inventory and depending on which consonants are considered phonemic, has an inventory larger than Ubykh. Most phonemes have the primary articulation similar to most European languages, with a few unusual and some dialectal sounds that may be very difficult to learn (such as /tɬˀ/). However, the real difficulty lies in their secondary articulations. Almost all consonants may be labialized and aspirated, all stops can be palatalized and many dialects also distinguish labio-palatalization. Phonetically, dialects differ significantly and often to the point of being regarded as separate languages due to reduced mutual intelligibility. In general, the varieties are split between west, central and east, according to their phonetic differences. Grammar Various features of the grammar for later elaboration: * NOUNS ** All nouns are constructed with CVC pattern. ** Almost all Inarian words are either true nouns or act as if they were ones. ** They are formed with either the monosyllabic root itself or with a "thematic vowel" attached to it. For example ''кум ( ) 'moon' and гошма ( ), the latter ending with -a. ** Absolutive-Ergative language, perhaps with some nominative-accusative split. ** Three numbers: singular, dual and plural, all expressed with a suffix. ** Four true cases: absolutive, ergative, genitive and dative. *** Since all affixes are essentially particles, depending on definition, one could argue that Inarian has a whole lot more cases. This is especially true for many dialects. It is, however, worth noting that they rarely work alone, so that they typically bear a particle AND a case, somewhat similar to how German works. * ADJECTIVES ** All adjectives are basically nouns with various adjective-making derivatives. Some few words, like colours, could be considered inherently adjectives. These typically have no additional marks attached and act like nouns together with adjective morphology. * PRONOUNS ** Generally act just like nouns. However, personal pronouns are unusual. ** Personal pronouns have a strong tendency being integrated to verbs, thus greatly simplifying clauses. For instance, ergative constructions may not be visible that way as instead, the particle order does the job. * VERBS ** Most words are essentially nouns, with various particles and classifiers changing their class. *** Typically, root + thematic vowel = noun / pronoun and root = verb with the remainder being either particles or bearing some kind of derivative affix. It may seem reversed but it is due to fact that while nouns may appear in their unmodified form, verbs do always have at least some kind of suffix attached. *** As mentioned below, there are very few true verbs, if none at all. They are all formed from nouns that either bear verbal morphology directly or have some kind of particle (usually ta-) added to it. ** Being basically nouns, verbs also adhere to nominal CVC pattern. ** The copula (ha-) is usually optional. Some dialects inflect it but usually it is a particle. *** The personal prefixes mi-, si- and ti- originate from these inflected forms. Essentially, this feature turns words into verbs. One could argue that the auxiliary verbs are the only true verbs in Inarian.